Wednesday’s decision by the European Commission to recommend scrapping of EU visas for Macedonian citizens represents a genuine victory for the country and its people, the country’s prime minister said. In his address to the nation, Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski Wednesday afternoon heartily welcomed the lifting of the visa regime …

The European Commission’s decision not to grant visa-free travel to Albanian citizens has been met with little surprise in Tirana, where the issue was the subject of heated debate during the recent election campaign. Opposition leader Edi Rama, who is the mayor of Tirana, told reporters that the EU rejection …

Bulgaria lacks political will in its fight against corruption and organized crime, according to a draft of the European Union report on the country’s judiciary reform progress due to be published on July 22, Bulgarian news agencies reported. “The country is said to have made some progress in further reforming …

The European Commission’s Wednesday recommendation to grant a visa-free regime with the EU to Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia, but not to Bosnia and Albania, has met strong criticism across the Balkans and elsewhere in Europe. Critics say the EU’s exclusion of Bosnia from the list sends a negative message to …

Macedonia will soon wrap up its judiciary reforms to ensure a recommendation to begin EU accession talks, senior Macedonian officials said Wednesday. At a joint press conference, Macedonian Deputy Prime Minister in Charge of European AffairsVasko Naumovski and Justice Minister Mihajlo Manevski vowed to speed up reforms.

In a move designed to lessen Eastern Europe’s dependence on Russian gas, Bulgaria and Greece have signed an agreement for the construction of an alternative gas pipeline in the region. The agreement comes on the heels of a Nabucco pipeline deal signed in Turkey on Monday. The Bulgarian state-owned Energy …

The European Commission proposed on Wednesday letting citizens of Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia, which have been promised eventual EU membership, travel to the European Union without visas from Jan. 1. The EU executive said it hoped to make a similar proposal for Albania and Bosnia by the middle of next …

Bosnia-Herzegovina will start issuing out biometric passports from January 1, 2010 to all its citizens, despite the fact that they will still have to have visas for most travels abroad. Bosnia`s Prime Minister Nikola Spiric presented the new biometric passport at a press conference in Sarajevo on Wednesday. The new …

MOSCOW The Presidents of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan will meet in Moscow on July 18 to discuss the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement, presidential aide Sergei Prikhodko said on Wednesday. 

The American guided missile destroyer USS Stout has dropped anchor off the Georgian Black Sea port of Batumi to take part naval training exercises with Georgian coastguards and Turkish ships.